Lifeboat Foundation

Clint Brauer’s farm outside of Cheney, Kansas, could be described as Old MacDonald’s Farm plus robots. Along with 5,500 square feet of vegetable-growing greenhouses, classes teaching local families to grow their food, a herd of 105 sheep, and Warren G—a banana-eating llama named after the rapper—is a fleet of ten, 140-pound, battery-operated robots.

Brauer, the co-founder of Greenfield Robotics, grew up a farm kid. He left for the big city tech and digital world, but eventually made his way back to the family farm. Now, it’s the R&D headquarters for the Greenfield Robotics team, plus a working farm.

When Brauer returned to his agricultural roots, he did so with a purpose: to prove that food could be grown without harmful chemicals and by embracing soil- and planet-friendly practices. He did just that, becoming one of the premier farmers growing vegetables in Kansas without pesticides, selling to local markets, grocery store chains, and chefs.

The rapid development of renewable energy resources has triggered tremendous demands in large-scale, cost-efficient and high-energy-density stationary energy storage systems.

Lithium ion batteries (LIBs) have many advantages but there are much more abundant metallic elements available such as sodium, potassium, zinc and aluminum.

These elements have similar chemistries to lithium and have recently been extensively investigated, including sodium-ion batteries (SIBs), potassium-ion batteries (PIBs), zinc-ion batteries (ZIBs), and aluminum-ion batteries (AIBs). Despite promising aspects relating to redox potential and energy density the development of these beyond-LIBs has been impeded by the lack of suitable electrode materials.

Tesla is working on a compact car that will be manufactured in China and distributed worldwide. The battery technologies required for a compact car will be unveiled at Tesla Battery Day that will enable Tesla to make a small car for less than $25,000, possibly close to $20,000 or less. The battery cost is the main factor to drive down the cost of an electric vehicle. The compact car is coming soon after Tesla Battery Day technologies are revealed. The new batteries will allow Tesla to shrink the battery pack’s size while offering enough range for everyday driving. Elon Musk’s speech at the launch event in China suggests the car will be quite unique, just like the Cybertruck.

WATCH NEXT: https://youtu.be/3ni0T6yxJ_U

Continue reading “Tesla’s $20,000 Compact Car — Coming Soon After Tesla Battery Day Reveals New Batteries” »

Brain-inspired computing paradigms have led to substantial advances in the automation of visual and linguistic tasks by emulating the distributed information processing of biological systems. The similarity between artificial neural networks (ANNs) and biological systems has inspired ANN implementation in biomedical interfaces including prosthetics and brain-machine interfaces. While promising, these implementations rely on software to run ANN algorithms. Ultimately, it is desirable to build hardware ANNs that can both directly interface with living tissue and adapt based on biofeedback. The first essential step towards biologically integrated neuromorphic systems is to achieve synaptic conditioning based on biochemical signalling activity. Here, we directly couple an organic neuromorphic device with dopaminergic cells to constitute a biohybrid synapse with neurotransmitter-mediated synaptic plasticity. By mimicking the dopamine recycling machinery of the synaptic cleft, we demonstrate both long-term conditioning and recovery of the synaptic weight, paving the way towards combining artificial neuromorphic systems with biological neural networks.

On Friday afternoon, Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Director of Policy and Government Affairs Craig Hulse landed in Tulsa, OK, for a meeting with local officials. Musk’s trip comes amidst Tesla’s highly anticipated announcement about the site of the Cybertruck Gigafactory, the electric car maker’s upcoming manufacturing plant for its unique all-electric pickup.

Musk and Hulse were welcomed by Gov. Kevin Stitt and Secretary of Commerce Sean Kouplen, as well as the property owner of a plot of land that the city is offering to the electric car maker. Images shared by the Gov. Stitt show Musk and local officials conversing in the middle of a massive plot of land. The meetup seemed to be private and simple, though the governor highlighted that he still believes that Tulsa is the perfect place for Tesla’s next vehicle production plant.

BloombergNEF and Sustainable Energy for All have jointly published a report by the Mini-Grid Partnership proposing solar minigrids as a critical technology to bring electricity to the 789 million people who still lack access.

Interesting technology for myriad reasons. Game changer for people in underdeveloped coastal areas.

The World’s Only Low Cost Portable Seawater Desalination Device. Ultimate Survival Tool | Check out ‘QuenchSea: Turn Seawater into Freshwater’ on Indiegogo.

Sure, the Harley-Davidson LiveWire electric motorcycle may be designed for urban riders, but that doesn’t mean it can’t handle long distance trips. At least that’s what Diego Cardenas just proved after completing a ride from the US-Mexico border to the US-Canada border to celebrate his 50th birthday!

The buildings that produce the goods we use every single day are changing.